Gaurav, our in-house wine sommelier for Stratus Restaurant is a passionate wine lover and enthusiast from India. His first exposure to wine was in his under-graduation in ‘Hospitality and Hotel Administration’, when he got an opportunity to visit a winery in Nashik (Western Part of India). This short college trip inspired him to become a perpetual student of wine.
To continue the wine quest, Gaurav chose the field of Food and Beverage Service and worked with the well renowned hotel chain in India and abroad. He worked with Taj Hotels and Resorts and Hyatt Hotels as Guest Service Associate. This experience helped him to learn different aspects of hospitality such as customer satisfaction and inventory control. Afterwards he joined Leela Group of Hotels as Food & Beverage Supervisor. As a restaurant supervisor, he was not only responsible for monitoring daily service, but also to train his team about hotel food, wine menu and specifications. After working in India for about 5 years, Gaurav moved to Qatar and joined Oryx Rotana Hotel in Doha as Assistant Food & Beverage Manager. Here, he managed a team of varying backgrounds and provided wine training on an ongoing basis. Throughout his hotel experience he led by example consistently learning and instilling the highest standard for quality and superior customer service.
Gaurav’s ‘Keep Learning’ attitude encouraged him to move to Canada in 2014 and joined Niagara College for studying winemaking and learning about wine economics. After graduating, he started working in Trius Winery in Niagara as a wine tour guide, explaining to all the visitors about how the grapes are grown and wine is made. Gaurav’s love for food and wine made him move to Toronto and enrolled in a tailor-made course in George Brown College for budding wine sommeliers. To become a certified sommelier, he further continued his wine education and pursued certifications from Wine & Spirit Education Trust and Court of Master Sommelier.
The passion Gaurav has for the hospitality industry is derived from the natural ability he has for building strong and lasting relationships with people, in addition to consistently striving to deliver unique and memorable experiences to his customers.